What database technology would best suit my project ?

This is a discussion on What database technology would best suit my project ? within the A Brief History of Cprogramming.com forums, part of the Community Boards category; Title says it all. Basically, I am working for a laboratory and I have noticed that there is a lot ...

What database technology would best suit my project ?

Title says it all. Basically, I am working for a laboratory and I have noticed that there is a lot of paperwork that could be turned into an application / database. For example, production reports could very well fit a database and maintenance schedules could be integrated in that database as well. I have followed a course called "Information Technologies in Organizations" at college (HEC Montreal, business school) that I think will be very useful to help model the business process that is associated with my project. However, I don't know what technology would be suit my project (hence the title). I have to take into account that reports will be sent from manager to manager and hence I will need to be able to export to different file formats. I also have to take into account the limits / advantages / disadvantages of each technology. For example, Access is the application I know best but its possibilities are quite limited outside of database management and if the company I work for updates their systems in the future and that Access 2003/2007 is not supported then the application becomes useless.

Any help is *much* appreciated.

A few more pieces of information:

I have decent knowledge of C/C++, I have used SQL in the past, I know the Office Suite quite well, I am willing to learn a new (programming) language if it is required.

Until you can build a working general purpose reprogrammable computer out of basic components from radio shack, you are not fit to call yourself a programmer in my presence. This is cwhizard, signing off.